After a money back return from the casino on Saturday night, Sunday brought about the christening of Isabella, aka Muddy's daughter. It was St Francis Church, Acklam for the service, then back to the old Nash club for refreshments, and plenty of refreshments were had! It was a brilliant day out - everybody seemed to be having fun, and at closing time (6ish) we headed to the Roundel for tea and then ended up back at the club with the gang. The only problem was the fact I had a very busy day at work on Monday. Hmm. As if Mondays aren't bad enough to get up for at the best of times, I managed to drag my carcass out of bed and into work (thanks Chris for the lift). Once I was there the mountain of work took away any feelings I had, and I got done what I needed and decided as a reward for my hard work to take the Tuesday off.

Never been seen footage of Matthew with a pint!

Monday night brought about the quiz night again, and again we were down to just three. Buoyed on by the amount of social interaction we were getting, we managed to acheive the (almost) impossible and finish a very respectable 4th, as well as capturing a £5 spot prize. The highlight answer of the night from my hazy memory was dad pulling out of the bag who Conrad Murray is. Answer at the bottom of the blog.Tuesday was a catch up day of rest before we went out to the Hartlepool match. Due to the terrible weather in January, a lot of matches were rearranged for Tuesday nights so there are plenty of matches to go to in March. It was, in the eyes of most, a must win match against a Colchester side who were only 8 points above us, a great chance to close the gap. Despite them having a man sent off in the first half and us absolutely battering their goal, it ended up 0-0. Certainly 2 points dropped instead of 1 gained, but nobody knows yet how costly that might be.We discovered on Thursday that there was a potential Anglo - Saxon metal hoard at the bottom of our garden. OK, it turned out to be just a manhole we didn't realise we had, but it was a good job it was unearthed as it turned out some little bugger in the area had been pouring gallons of cooking fat down the drain and the locals were having problems. That wasn't the only excitement for the day as our new bedroom furniture had arrived. After recently spending 3 hours fixing a bookcase together, I was fully DIY'd up enough to get a 2 door wardrobe rigged up in 2 hours, and that was including breaks to see Spurs demolish Inter Milan. I never got round to the 3 door wardrobe, or the chest of drawers, or the bedside cabinet so they will be waiting over the weekend for me *sigh*. All of which brings me back up to date. Still, not a mention of walking in sight, I know. I have been tremendously busy at work lately with deadlines which have left me tired, but now they are out of the way I hope to pick up my training in earnest. What is terrifying is the countdown widget I have put on my blog sidebar. It tells me there are only 73 days until I start the walk. On Monday I intend to put my intensive head on and 'get on it'.Finally I want to give a big shout to Mike, from Hull, who made a massive donation of £100 to my Just Giving site for a signed Hull City shirt, and thanks to Chris for making it happen. That takes the fundraising well over the £500 mark. I will be putting a blog up soon on the various ways you can donate, so make sure you don't miss that!Oh and finally, finally, I feel I should mention the passing of one of Granda's heroes yesterday, jazz trumpeter Kenny Ball. He had seen him a number of times and even had a photograph of him on his living room wall. If it wasn't Louis Armstrong playing at Grandas it would be Kenny Ball, with my favourite being the track where he sings a number of naughty limericks. There once was a woman called Joan..........Ahhhh, Kenny Ball RIP.

Kenny Ball in action

And for those of you who were wondering, Conrad Murray was the doctor to Michael Jackson at the time of his death. Well done Collo.